“Constance, I do see. And I could tell you I understand. But nobody, nobody could fully appreciate what it’s like to be blessed — cursed — with a life like yours. The terrible things you’ve witnessed, the years you endured alone... those are burdens you never asked to bear. And, alas, burdens only you can truly understand.”
Constance sat back, looking at him silently.
“But you’ve told me, whispered to me, of so much. I know your history almost as well as you do. Your life is not that of Miss Frost. You have me now.”
“I have you,” she echoed distantly.
Pendergast began to speak. “Constance, I don’t know how to—”
“You may not,” she interrupted. “But I do. So let’s get back to the reason you asked me here.”
“My dear Constance—”
“You need my help again. What are these answers you mentioned that only I can ask her?”
Pendergast hesitated, then — looking into her eyes — left his sentence unfinished. Instead, he reached into his jacket pocket and removed a folded sheet of what looked like airline stationery. “Four questions.”
Constance began to unfold the sheet, but Pendergast put a hand on hers. “She may lie at first — after all, she’s spent most of her lifetime lying. But she must be made to understand that what she’s been doing all these years now threatens to destroy Savannah. If necessary, show her these.” And, reaching into his jacket, he pulled out some beautifully composed photographs of a farm by the edge of a lake.
“How bucolic,” she said. Then she unfolded the sheet he’d given her. She read it once, twice, before looking up in disbelief. “These questions... they’re mad. Are you—?”
“I know how they seem,” he interrupted. “But if I’m right, Frost won’t think them mad at all.” Reaching forward and taking her other hand, he spoke quietly, urgently, for several minutes. The surprise on Constance’s face deepened — then turned slowly to astonishment. Her guardian, quite obviously, was in the throes of some all-consuming puzzle; the hands that gripped hers were icy cold.
“Be gentle, if you can,” he said. “But these questions must be asked with authority—and you cannot leave her rooms until you’re sure she has told you the truth.”
“That hardly seems like a recipe for fostering a relationship,” Constance said.
“This is more important than any relationship!” These angry, impatient words seemed to burst out of him. Then Pendergast looked away, and — for the first time in her memory — he flushed deeply.
When he did not release her hand, she detached it herself, then stood immediately. “I’ll do what I can.”
“I can ask no more,” he replied after a pause. “Except to promise you that—”
Without waiting to hear the rest, Constance turned and left the small room. A moment later, her heels could be heard crossing the marble floor of the suite’s foyer; then a door opened and shut, and only silence remained.
48
Wellstone sat in his car in the last of the gloaming, outside the three-story brick warehouse that Betts and his crew had leased the top floor of. He had found himself driving there, with no plan in mind, no goal, just a simmering anger mixed with feelings of frustration and humiliation. The son of a bitch had gotten the better of him at every turn: not because he was smarter, but because he had the sort of low cunning of a natural-born bully.
The warehouse was a charming old building — as far as warehouses went — in an old part of Savannah about half a dozen blocks from the Ye Sleepe. How nice for Betts that he could afford both sleeping quarters and a studio setup. It aggravated Wellstone to think of Betts getting this level of financing, or for that matter any financing at all. It was a sad commentary on how gullible people were — the ignorance, lack of education, and credulity that allowed a cynical fraudster like Betts to rake in the bucks.
Thinking about Betts brought to mind the feel of soufflé sauce sliding down his neck, and the memory offered up a fresh surge of outrage. If he’d gotten his hands on the SD cards with the fake, preloaded images, that would have finished Betts forever and exposed Moller as the charlatan he was. It was almost unbelievable, how those three would-be demons Moller Bluetoothed to the press had gone viral. If he’d been able to expose them as fakes, showing those SD cards of creepy images before they had been superimposed on freshly taken photos, that would have gotten him on every morning show in America.
He shouldn’t have been surprised that Fayette would screw up. Of course she would. He was annoyed at himself for thinking otherwise. But then, his own plan to access Moller’s camera — so carefully thought out — had failed as well. He couldn’t imagine how another opportunity would arise. He was out of options.
His thoughts were interrupted by some people coming out of the building. Among them were Betts and Moller. They got into one of two white rental vans parked in front — no Ubers this time. Maybe they were going somewhere to shoot. Seeing Betts and Moller and their self-satisfied faces only sharpened his feelings of shame and anger. Those SD cards were his ticket, and they were so close — Moller was toting his briefcase — that Wellstone could practically touch them. Was he falling into that journalistic trap of becoming personally involved in the story?
Another group of people came out, among them that cute DP, everyone toting camera equipment. The muscle-bound bastard who had pushed him in the restaurant loaded it in the back of a second van and slammed the doors. They all piled inside, laughing and talking.
Wellstone’s curiosity went up a notch. They were going on a shoot. But at this time of night? Why the hurry? Nothing like a new murder had happened... at least, not that he knew of.
Almost without thinking, he started the car. The vans went off in a screech. A moment later, Wellstone’s car eased away from the curb and began to trail them.
49
Wellstone followed the two vans through the narrow streets of Savannah, negotiating a snarling mass of detours and police barricades caused by some political rally, until at last all three vehicles were moving freely along Skidaway Road. He realized they must be heading to the cemetery, and sure enough, within minutes the vans took the turn onto Bonaventure Road and pulled into the parking lot at the cemetery welcome center. Wellstone drove past the stone gates, then parked on a nearby side street. He grabbed his Canon with its 200mm telephoto lens and walked back to the cemetery entrance. The vans had left the parking lot and were inside the cemetery now, heading slowly down one of the graveled lanes. They disappeared among the oaks, but Wellstone wasn’t concerned: he was certain they were heading to the same place as before — the site of the boy’s abduction.
It was a pleasant evening in the cemetery, the dying light throwing long shadows over the silent tombs. But Wellstone was in no mood to enjoy the peace. This was his last chance. He was going to bird-dog those bastards, Betts and Moller, until he had proof of fraud.
The cemetery was large, and it was close to half a mile to where he finally spotted the vans: parked where he expected at the far end of a lane, in the old part of the cemetery. He approached cautiously. As far as he could tell, there were no tourists or other visitors. The place was deserted. Normally it closed at sunset, but it looked like Betts had obtained permission to film past then.
Moving closer, he saw there was no one in or near the vans. The crime-scene tape had been taken down from the area, and this corner of the cemetery had been restored to its former desuetude and abandonment. So where were they? He located the tomb of the angel with upraised arm, where the abduction had occurred — but there was no one there, either.